The Oklahoma City Thunder struck down the Chicago Bulls 98-85 at the United Center tonight.

The Bulls looked good early on, but fell apart in the second half, only scoring 33 points, some of which were giveaway scores by the Thunder in the final minutes of the game, when they already had assured the victory.

The Bulls problem was that they had a complete inability to score in the half court. A large part of this was a result of the Thunder playing great half court defense. The Thunder’s half court defense was stifling. They closed out on shooters well, and packed the lane with big men waiting for charges, which slowed the Bulls penetration game.

But the other problem is that the Bulls have no one that can really create their own shot in the half court against tough defense. They had one of those players last year in Ben Gordon, and it looks like they will need to find a new one in free agency this summer, so that outcomes like tonight’s game don’t become a common scene. Derrick Rose is still easy to stop because of his lack of range, which allows the defense to pack it in, allowing most good teams to shut down his driving lanes. Surrounded by poor shooters, the Bulls can’t make opponents pay when they overplay Rose defensively, as the Bulls miss these jumpshots all too often, and in this game in particular, the Thunder did a great job closing out on shooters, not allowing the Bulls to take easy jumpshots.

The Thunder were led by Russell Westbrook who had 29 points, 6 assists, and 7 rebounds. Westbrook was a real handful, and Rose did a poor job guarding him. Westbrook scored early on by penetrating and scoring around the basket, but later in the game, he was scoring on some laxly guarded jumpshots that the Bulls were giving him.

Derrick Rose conversely had 19 points on 9-20 shooting, along with 7 assists. The Thunder did a good job contesting Rose’s drives to the baskets, which forced Rose into scoring inefficiently tonight. Rose continued to attack the basket aggressively, which drew the defense with him, opening up some easy offensive rebounding opportunities for his teammate. The Bulls snatched up an impressive 25 offensive rebounds tonight, many of which came on Rose’s misses. That is rebounding on 39% of their misses, which is impressive.

The Thunder also got a lot of help from their other star, Kevin Durant, who finished with 25 points. Durant was silky smooth scoring the ball, although he had some ball handling issues which led to his 6 turnovers, but overall, he played great.

Luol Deng had a double double with 15 points and 10 rebounds, although he scored the ball inefficiently. Joakim Noah also had a double double with 14 points and 14 rebounds. Taj Gibson fell short of the double double with 10 points and 9 rebounds. Gibson played well early in the game, but did little in the second half, although neither did any of his teammates.

Kirk Hinrich continued his good play since returning to the starting lineup scoring 15 points along with 7 assists. One has to wonder whether Hinrich’s poor play early on was a result of him putting himself in a mental funk because he was sulking because he had to come off the bench. Hinrich played fine off the bench last year, so being uncomfortable coming off the bench leading to his poor play is unlikely.

James Harden had 13 points off the bench for the Thunder, hitting many timely threes. The former Bull, Thabo Sefolosha, finished with 7 points and 9 rebounds.

John Salmons struggled, shooting 1-8, as did Tyrus Thomas, who shot 3-12.

With the loss, the Bulls fall to 14-18 on the season.

This past week, John Paxson appeared on Lunch With a Legend to discuss various issues surrounding the Bulls. Here is a recap of what was said during the radio appearance.

• The roster is better since the deadline deals.
• He would like to see an 8 or 9 man rotation with Luol Deng in there.  He is not sure what will happen with Deng for the rest of the year.
• The Bulls have a scouting staff.  It is Jay Hillock’s job to go out and identify players in the league who are a little undervalued.  The Bulls were on John Salmons since the beginning of the year.
• The key to making the trade happen was the willingness to take on Brad Miller’s contract for next year.
• There is still some work to do to prepare the Bulls for 2010.  The Bulls have options on their roster to allow them to do it.
• Paxson likes what Salmons can do off the dribble.  Longterm, he can play either at the 2 or 3.  He doesn’t have a lot of mileage on him because he didn’t play a lot of minutes so far in his career.  Salmons can be really good for a number of years.
• There is a definite injury in Luol Deng’s leg.  They have chosen to take activity away from him.  He is starting to run a little bit.  They have a treadmill that takes his body weight off of him.
• Luol Deng is the only one who can give an answer to why there is an organizational divide.  Paxson would have liked for Luol to tell the organization which doctors he wanted to talk to first.  However, the Bulls still got on board with the doctor Luol chose.  The Bulls’ diagnosis was right from the beginning.
• The problem with the Big Mac booing was that Kirk Hinrich had an unbelievable game.  Wishes that people would get in their cars saying what a great game it was, but they booed Kirk instead. You’d like to see the fans up on their feet cheering, especially when you beat the Pistons.
• Paxson has never claimed his free Big Mac after the game.
• He is not fearful that Luol Deng will not become the player they thought he would be.  He thinks that Deng is more of a system guy who plays off the strengths of others.  He still thinks that Deng will become a very good player.  He evaluated last year that the small forward position is a really valuable one.  He believes that Deng will have value and has value now.  Down the road you may have Deng to move in a deal, to which Paxson recovered with, “We don’t have any intention of moving Luol Deng.”  He has talked to teams around the league, and Deng does have value.
• He thinks that Neil Funk and Stacey King have a nice rapport.
• The Bulls have always battled the small backcourt.  John Salmons gives the opportunity to play with a bigger backcourt.  he thinks with Derrick’s size that can be a formidable backcourt, and that’ without talking about Ben Gordon, who Paxson thinks can play a terrific role for the Bulls.  He feels tha tthe Bulls now have some real scorers on the team with John Salmons, Ben Gordon, and Derrick Rose.
• Some of Ben Gordon’s future is financial.  Money deals aer becoming a reality in the league right now.  He would love to keep Gordon.  They tried the last two years, made substantial offers, and for whatever reason it didn’t work out.  He doesn’t assign blame to anyone for the failed negotiations.  They will have a chance to look at the big picture this summer and try to get him back.
• Again reitererated that he is the GM now and plans to be the GM.  If anything changes he will let everbody know.  Peter Vescey, the Suntimes, and David Aldridge were bogus and so out of reality.  The health stuff especially, he has no idea why Aldridge would bring that up.  he feels no obligation to lend credibility to these uys.  He thinks he proved that he is committed to the job at the trade deadline.
• Being able to break Larry Hughes big contract into two smaller pieces could help the Bulls make a trade in the future.
• When the Bulls got John Salmons they knew Thabo Sefolosha wasn’t going to play.  Of course, they could not have foreseen Luol Deng’s injury.  Having Sefolosha’s contract on the books next year would have caused some problems.
• They have another promotion going where they are going to be wearing a different color of green.  An environmental green.
• They are going to wear Los Bulls against the Heat.  Los Bulls and El Heat is the way the Hispanic speakers say it, not Los Toros.
• He thought Derrick Rose was terrific off the bat.  Has seen significant improvement in two areas: 1.  His shot has gotten more consistent, especially from the elbows.  2. His decision making has gotten better.  He thinks that Rose will probably be a higher turnover guy, but the greatest assist guy, John Stockton, was a high turnover guy as well.  He needs to grow on the defensive end.  he gets caught watching the ball a lot of the time.
• There was never a mandate for Vinny Del Negro to put Derrick Rose on the floor in clutch time.  They all know that Rose is the b iggest part of their future.  The whole organization wants to see him learn at the end of games.
• Had a preference for Rose to be in the game in the first Miami game.  Have to allow learning on the job when you hire someone with no head coaching experience.  The goal is to try to help Vinny become the best head coach he can be.  He is beginning to grow into that role.  Vinny is under contract the next couple of years, you don’t just give a guy a contract and then just get rid of him.  There is so much pressure to win, that decisions are made.  But if you do something like that, you have to ask yourself, what are you going to do.
• Paxson thinks we have a great opportunity to make the playoffs.  Maybe the biggest reason to make the playoffs is to get Rose some playoff experience.
• He can’t do anything about Noah and Thomas’ age and maturity.  The biggest thing for those guys was getting consistent time when the injuries occurred.  Noah is a guy who just cares about winning.  He thinks that Noah has played very well since getting consistent minutes and the starting job.  He thinks Thomas is similar.  When Drew Gooden got hurt, Tyrus Thomas got the minutes.  His ability at times has shown.  If tThomas would run the floor more, he would get a few more dunks a game.  Him and Noah have a nice thing going and Brad Miller is helping those two.
• Paxson throws things during games.  He kicked in the panel by the TV in the lockerroom.  He fins it frustrating that with all the things done to make players’ lives easier that you don’t see them recripocating what your doing for them.  There stll seems to be a distrust of the organization’s intentions which he cannot understand.
• The White House day was odd.  He first heard about Norm Van Lier when they were getting on the bust to the White House.  People were drawn to Norm because he was going to tell it like it was and people liked to hear it.  Norm was part of those Bulls teams that were endeared by the city for the way they played.  He remembers when they won their first championship that Norm felt a part of it.  The Bulls were so fortunate to meet the president, especially with the historical significance of President Obama.
• Paxson showed a picture of his son Ryan to Obama.  Paxson’s son Ryan, joined the military.  Paxson has great respect for every young person who decides to join the military.  Ryan’s path was a little bit different becauseh e was playing basketball, but felt it in his heart to enlist.  It shows that there are young people out there willing to take something more difficult on.  He is proud that Ryan, as a person coming from an affluent situation not having a sense of entitlement.
• Johnny Red Kerr was in a lot of pain for the last several weeks.  He was a good man.  He did just about everything for the Bulls outside of playing.  You can call him a homer ,but that’s because he loved the Chicago Bulls.  Today, it’s more analysis, but Johnny was going to tell you how much he loved the Bulls players.

The Chicago Bulls defeated the Oklahoma City 103 to 96 in Oklahoma City to get a much needed road win.

The Bulls in the first half were led by Ben Gordon, who scored 16 points in the first half, and was just scoring at will. Gordon had a rough second half, and finished with 18 pointso n 8-17 shooting. This was a game where Gordon kind of had Derrick Rose syndrome. He shot a respectable 47.1 FG%, but finished with a poor scoring efficiency because he failed to get to the free throw line a bunch of times and failed to make any three point field goals.

Derrick Rose, however, took over in the second half. Rose scored 22 of his 25 points in the second half. He was just unstoppable in the second half, his jumpshot was falling. When Rose plays well, the Bulls usually win, and tonight was one of those nights.

This game was especially important because of the implications on rookie fo the year. Rose was going head to head against another rookie of the year contender, Russell Westbrook. Westbrook finished with 15 points on 6-16 shooting, and also had 6 assists. Having a great game against a fellow ROY contender is a good way to secure the award.

John Salmons was good as always, finishing with 20 points on 8-15 shooting. Salmons has played so well that it is time to give him a nickname, well at least an attempt to give him a nickname. I hereby dub the great John Salmons, “Salmonella”. You better watch out for Salmonella, because he might just infect your team with a loss.

Brad Miller played well once again. He finished with 14 points, 6 rebounds, and 5 assists.

Tyrus Thomas was solid, finishing with 12 points, 11 rebounds, and 3 steals. Thomas failed to get a block in the game, so his streak of blocked shots ends at 29 games. His front court counterpart, Joakim Noah, had three blocks in the game.

For the Thunder, Kevin Durant had 28 points on 9-21 shooting. Jeff Green added in 18 points.

The former Bulls, Thabo Sefolosha, finished with 6 points, 3 steals, and 4 blocks.

With the win, the Bulls improve to 32-37 on the season. They still site securely in that eighth seed in the Eastern Conference.

Closing Comments

Tonight was a good win for the Bulls. Yes, it was against the Thunder, who aren’t very good, but have been playing better as of late. But we need to start out with some wins against teams like the Thunder. The bottomline is that the playoffs are there for the Bulls taking, and not just that, but potentially the Bulls could move up into that 4 vs. 5 matchup. We’ve seen the Bulls go on late season surges in the past, and this season may prove no differnet. We have 9 games at home, against many mediocre opponents. We aren’t exactly playing good teams on the road, with Washington, Toronto, Indiana, and Detroit being the remaining teams. At the beginning of the season we all looked at the stretch run as being an easy set of games that will help us secure a playoff spot. This seems to be the case. Good win Bulls, now go follow it up against the Lakers on Saturday.

Just a little interesting picture to see on the Yahoo! NBA page today, that showed two former Bulls among this weeks hot performers.

The Bulls were one of the busiest teams before the trade deadline yesterday, making three tradesk shipping out six players, and bringing back five.  Now tha the dust has settled, how do the Bulls stack up after the deadline, and what direction will they be taking the team?

Subtractions

• Andres Nocioni
• Drew Gooden
• Cedric Simmons
• Michael Ruffin
• Larry Hughes
• Thabo Sefolosha

Additions

• Brad Miller
• John Salmons
• Anthony Roberson
• Jerome James
• Tim Thomas
• 2009 San Antonio Spurs First Round Draft Pick

Starting by looking at the subtractions, the Bulls lost nothing of much significance.  Andres Nocioni was once an important cog in the Scott Skiles’ Bulls, but has really developed into a no defense chucker in the past two years.  Drew Gooden, while he could score from time to time, he was inconsistent, and not a very efficient scorer as a whole, and had weak interior defense.  Larry Hughes was no longer player, and said by some in the media to be a troublemaker.  Removing these three from the team could prove to be addition by subtraction.

Thabo Sefolosha was good sometimes, and played some good defense from time to time in his time here.  With the addition of John Salmons, he simply wasn’t going to play here.  A first round draft pick was good compensation for him.

Cedric Simmons and Michael Ruffin never played, so not much of a loss their on the basketball court.  Ruffin was one of the most active Bulls in the community season, and Simmons was very active as well, so I’m sure the Bulls will miss that aspect of having these two around, as both did a lot for the Bulls in terms of fan outreach.

Now, for the additions.  Jerome James and Anthony Roberson figure to never play in games for the Chicago Bulls, but Brad Miller, John Salmons, and Tim Thomas figure to play here.

Brad Miller is the new Antonio Davis.  That’s the way to look at this. He is the veteran big man who knows how to get things done in the NBA.  He can pass and shoot the midrange jumper, which will be big in the Bulls offense.  The Bulls also look to get a lot of leadership out of Miller. He will be a good guy to have around the team.

John Salmons is the second guy from the Kings that the Bulls acquired.  One thing to note, do not read too much into what Paxson said at the press conference yesterday.  Salmons is not the newly annointed great shooting guard of the Bulls.  Think back to the 2006 draft, and the press conference that followed it.  Paxson raved on and on about Viktor Khryapa.  The guy hardly played for us, and ended up being bought out.

This is not to say that John Salmons will not play.  He definitely will, and will be a rotation player.  He has a lot of talent, and I think starting next year, will be that elusive big guard, that backs up both Derrick Rose and Ben Gordon.  The bonus with John Salmons is that he can play at the small forward position as well, without the Bulls being undersized.  As long as the Bulls have four guards for these last 28 games of this year, Salmons role will probably be stunted.  But next year, if the Bulls trade Kirk Hinrich, which they nearly did at the deadline, then John Salmons will find himself in a big minute sixth man role.

Salmons isn’t quite as good as Paxson advertised.  Paxson was raving about his defense.  Just because Salmons is tall, doesn’t mean that he is a good defender.  On the season, Salmons has a D-Rtg of 116 and 0.0 defensive win shares, which makes him one of the worst defenders in the entire NBA.

You have to wonder how a guy like Salmons will hold up offensively when he joins a team like the Bulls, and is actually asked to exert some type of effort on defense.  With Salmons actually having to play defense, will we see his scoring efficiency fall?  Only time will tell.

Offensively, Salmons is pretty good.  He is averaging 18.3 PPG on 57.3 TS%, which makes him a really good scorer this year.  The one thing the Bulls needed was more efficient scorers, as they don’t have many guys that can score efficiently.  Salmons brings that component to the Bulls, joining Gordon as a player who has a TS% greater than 57%.  Salmons is shooting 41.8% from three point land.  Shooters are always welcome.

The big question is whether Salmons is just a one year wonder or not.  Prior to this season, the most Salmons has scored was 12.5 PPG in a season.  Outside of this year, Salmons hasn’t been a very good three point shooter.  Players as old as Salmons typically don’t make the kind of leap he has made this year.  This is eerily similar to the situation with Mike James in Toronto, an older player explodes for a big year on one of the worst teams in the league.

Does this mean John Salmons is a scrub in disguise?  No.  But he is not starter material, given his near league worst defense, and the fact that he has a better scorer and defender ahead of him in the lineup in Ben Gordon.  Salmons could make a good sixth man for the Bulls over the next few years, but anything more is just overreaching with him.

Tim Thomas is a decent acquisition.  He will be able to spread the floor with his jumpshot similar to what Nocioni did during his time here.  Thomas will do this in limited minutes at the power forward position.

What did these trades do for the Bulls in terms of building for the future?  It was simply asset building.

In terms of liquid assets going into next year, the Bulls have Brad Miller’s expiring contract, Jerome James’ expiring contract, Tim Thomas’ expiring contract, young prospects Tyrus Thomas and Joakim Noah, the rights to Omer Asik, their own 2009 draft pick, and the 2009 draft pick of the San Antonio Spurs.

In addition to those, the Bulls also have Kirk Hinrich and John Salmons, who some teams are sure to be interested in.

The Bulls now are loaded with tradeable assets.  Paxson is ready to swing a blockbuster trade.  It is just a matter of waiting for the time to come.  It could happen at the 2009 NBA draft, or prior to the 2010 trade deadline.

The small flaw with this plan is that it depends on the actions of other teams in the league.  But I feel this is a brilliant plan.  When Amare Stoudemire, Chris Bosh, Carlos Boozer, and others start becoming available on the trade market, Paxson is ready to make a deal.

That was kind of the plan going into this trade deadline.  The Bulls tried to get Amare Stoudemire for the expiring contract of Drew Gooden and some young prospects.  It didn’t work out, but Paxson has reloaded the Bulls with expiring contracts to give it another go next year.

Following this trade deadline, the Bulls future looks much brighter to me.  A key to all of this, is for the Bulls to re-sign Ben Gordon.  He is their best scorer, and will be crucial in this team becoming great.  Yes, Gordon isn’t good enough to lead a team by himself.  But as one of the best three pointers in the game, the fourth best fastbreak scorer in the NBA this season, and a tradtionally clutch scorer, he is exactly what you want out of one of the complementry players around Derrick Rose. As long as the Bulls re-sign Ben Gordon, they will be in a position to become a championship caliber team with one, big blockbuster trade at the deadline next year.

John Paxson gave a press conference following the 2009 trade deadline.  In the press conference, Paxson used the word “component” over and over again.  Here is a recap of what was said during the press conference:

• Paxson started off the press conference by stating that he is the general manager of the Bulls, that he is not resigning.  He is here, and will continue to be here.
• Moving Andres Nocioni was hard for him.  The first time he saw Nocioni play in the Kings Cup in Spain was how he played for the Bulls for four and a half years.  Nocioni represented everything that Paxson wants out of a player who puts on the Chicago Bulls uniform.
• Paxon thinks that both players acquired from the Kings fit the Bulls really well.  The Bulls were in need of a big guy who fits what they were trying to do offensively.  Brad Miller is a good passer.  The Bulls run a lot of stuff at the elbows where the big guys have to pass and do dribble hand offs.  Paxson thinks Miller will help the young bigs.
• John Salmons is in Paxson’s mind, and underrated player.  The Bulls have been looking for legitimate size in the backcourt for sometime, and they think they finally have it in Salmons.  Salmons can also play some small forward.  Paxson likes that Salmons had to earn his way as a player, and feels that those guys who had to push themselves to become good players “get it”.  He was a big component to the Bulls making the trade with the Kings.
• The Bulls had been looking to move Larry Hughes.  Paxson told Hughes and his agent tha thy wold do whatever they could to move him.
• Tim Thomas can space the floor like Nocioni used to at the fourt spot.  After trading Nocioni, the Thomas component made a lot of sense in the Knicks trade.  The situation with Thomas is completely different than a few years ago.  Vinny Del Negro played with Thomas early in his career.
• The other players that the Bulls received from the Knicks were just part of the business, where you have to take on some guys.  Anthony Roberson will just be a practice guy.  Roberson is from Florida, and might be able to keep Joakim Noah in check.
• After the Brad Miller trade, he felt that Thabo Sefolosha wasn’t going to be playing much and would be the odd man out.  The Bulls got a first round pick to him, and Paxson found that to be a component of a good two days.
• Paxson thinks that it is always difficult to make a lot of seasons mid season and expect it to all mesh right away.  He is confdient in what they did as they did not give up any starters and added a component that they think can make the team better right now and looking towards the future.
• Likes the four components of Brad Miller, Joakim Noah, Tyrus Thomas, and Aaron Gray in the front court.  Thomas has been coming into his own a bit and playing better with more consistent minutes.  Joakim Noah has been playing better as well.
• Thinks veteran players who already know the NBA will have a better chance of blending in with what you already have.
• Right now, everyone is talking about the players that will be available in 2010, but what’s really important is to see how the NBA landscape changes with the economy.  Paxson thinks you are going to see more teams that have flexibility be able to trade into players for financial reasons.  Paxson feels that the Bulls have positioned themselves well for next year as they now have three fairly large expiring contracts, and those are always really valuable.  He is going to try to keep his eyes open to see what might become available using those.
• The Bulls will have the opportunity to do something with Ben Gordon again this summer.  The Bulls have not ruled out keeping Ben Gordon.  They may have to do another move in the summer that makes sense if they re-sign Gordon.  Paxson says that he understands the value that Ben brings to what they’re trying to do.  Gordon’s ability to score is important.  But the Gordon situation is down the road.  There is nothing that Paxson can do today to allow him to definitively know what will happen.  He respects and values Ben.
• Right now, Paxson is very pleased with his backcourt wings and thinks they improved there today.
• The Bulls had several deals on the table that they would have done, but the other teams in the last few days were thinking about it, and didn’t want to do it at the end of the day.  He is comfortable that he has done everything in his power to lookat every option available and every player available.  Given what was avialble, he feels that the Bulls did what they needed to do.
• Brad Miller has always been a good 15 to 17 foot shooter.  That is the one thing that the current bigs don’t have.  When Sacramento acquired Miller, they ran a lot of the Princeton Offense, which required all players to be able to dribble, pass, and shoot.  As long as big guys know how to play on the court htey will function very well on the basketball court.
• Paxson thinks that the Bulls are a better team on paper now than they were 36 hours ago.
• John Salmons was really key in the whole thing.  He gives the Bulls a guard with size, who can defense, and who can post up a little bit.  He believes that him and Luol Deng can play together, and that they could slide Salmons over to the three, and Deng at the four, and play Gordon at the two, with Derrick at the one.  As long as the Bulls can move the ball and get shots, they are going to be a good team offensively.  Salmons gives the Bulls a defensive component.
• Vinny will make the decisions on who starts.
• Salmons has been playing better for a few reasons.  Sacramento has been playing a little quicker tempo.  Salmons has shot the ball better this year from the perimeter.  That was not always a strength of his, but he’s shooting a little over 40% this year from three.  Everyone in the league sees a players prime from 27 to 31, as that is when they have it both mentally and physically.  Paxson really likes that Salmons has good ball skills.  He feels the game now requires players to put the ball on the floor and make plays, and Salmons can do that.  Salmons can play in screen and roll situations.  With his size, he doesn’t always get trapped and overwhelmed with bigger players.
• Not totally there yet if the Bulls want to pursue 2010.  Going into this summer, if the Bulls made one other move they would be positions really, really well.  The big names are out there in 2010, but the reality of that is that most of them will re-sign with their current teams because they can make so much more money on their current teams.  The Bulls are looking at the economics of the businss that at the trade deadline next year, they have expiring contracts and trade chips.  Hope a significant player becomes available because a team is unable to retain him.  Already saw that with Tyson Chandler being traded to Oklahoma City.  Wants to be ready when those deals present themslelves.
• Thinks there are some players that would like to be paired with Derrick Rose.  The Bulls have to position themselve sto be able to do that and sell what they got there.  Rose is a really good selling point for the Bulls.
• The Sacramento trade was a basketball deal, and they tok on some salary in order to do it.
• Couldn’t quite accomplish everything in one full swoop.  Tried, but it didn’t come together.  They will have chances in the next year to significantly improve their team.
• The Bulls will receive San Antonio’s pick in the trade with the Thunder.
• Paxson talked with Steve Kerr a lot.  Amare Stoudemire obviously didn’t get moves.  He felt over the past 5 to 6 days, the reality was that Stoudemire was not getting traded.  It speaks of the environment tha they’re in that those things are even being considered.

Andres Nocioni appeared on Mully and Hanley to discuss the trade which sent him to Sacramento. Here is a recap of what was said in the interview:

• He was not shocked by the trade.  He had read a lot of rumors about the trade, so he was not surprised.
• It feels bad because he has to leave the Chicago Bulls.  He loves the team, he loves the city, he loves everybody.
• He is fine with the trade.  He understands the situation and why he was traded.  He is going to try to play as hard as he can in Sacramento and go there and play his game.
• Feels he was not having one of his better seasons.  Thinks it might be because of the system change after Scott Skiles left.  He is trying to figure out what he needs to do to be much better next year.  I is completely his fault for why he wasn’t playing very well this year.
• It is really tough for everybody because they were playing together for a long time.  He really appreciated what his teammates did for him.  He really appreciated playing with Luol Deng, Thabo Sefolosha, and Kirk Hinrich.
• He feels that playing for the Chicago Bulls was a great opportunity to play in the NBA.
• Nocioni thinks that Derrick Rose is going to be one of the best point guards in the NBA.  He thinks the Bulls are playing much better now and is certain that they will make the playoffs.  He understands that the Bulls needed a big guy, and thinks Brad Miller is a good player, who will help the Bulls a lot.
• He thinks that Vinny Del Negro is doing a much better job right now.  Thinks that Vinny is doing a great job as coach and that Vinny is a good communications guy.  No complains about Del Negro.
• Nocioni finished the interview by thanking Bulls fans.

You can listen to the interview at 670theScore.com